


Freefalling Discovery

by matrixrefugee



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: F/M, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-21
Updated: 2018-05-21
Packaged: 2019-05-09 16:56:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 568
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14720000
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/matrixrefugee/pseuds/matrixrefugee
Summary: During an early session under Miles's tutelage, Cobb meets someone with an intense amount of talent.





	Freefalling Discovery

It was not Dom's first time dream-sharing, though he was still a student. Miles had let him roam the dreamscape this time, letting him continue creating and shaping it as he saw fit. Of course, that left Dom the freedom to start adding Bauhaus boxes, and steel and glass towers to Miles's Baroque and Rococo structures, heedless of any projections that might be attracted and converge on his location.

Sure enough, as he caused a glass and reinforced concrete walkway to unfold between two buildings, he saw several passerby in the hallway behind him pause, eying him with suspicion and even anger. He walked away from them, nonchalantly, crossing over the connector he had built and making it fold back into the building, the moment that he stepped across. That cut him off from the projections behind him, but it attracted the attention of of more on the other side. They started to follow him, eyes burning. And he knew that this time, he could not make so easy an escape. Best to play it cool and walk away casually. Pretend that he had not done anything to change the landscape.

Three men in suits separated themselves from the crowd, striding toward him, their intent clear. Dom kept walking, hoping to shake them off, but they only quickened their pace. He ducked around a corner of the hallway and broke into a run.

Instead, the projections caught up with him, taking a detour around a corner and down a perpendicular corridor. He bolted down a hallway, though he knew it ended in a large window that opened onto dead air, ten stories up. It was a risk he would have to take: he could not die in the dream, as Miles had informed him.

He ran full out, shucking his jacket and wrapping it around his hands, holding it in front of his face as he barreled toward the window. He crashed through the glass, shards nicking and cutting his face. Even as his legs still pumped the air, he felt the floor of his stomach rise into his chest as he started to fall. The ground below rushed up toward him and the projections on the sidewalk looked up at him expectingly.

He hit something soft but solid, something rolled to the pavement with him. Something that yelped with surprise under him.

He looked down into the face of a woman, slightly older than he was, with wavy golden-brown hair. She was glaring at him and it dawned on him that she was not a projection.

"Excuse me, Miss," he mumbled, awkwardly, as he scrambled off her, then reached down to help her up.

"You must be my father's new student," she said, taking his hand, but she easily picked herself up and brushed off her long skirts. "You certainly have a way of making an entrance, Mister Cobb."

"You must be..."

"Mallorie Miles," she said, finishing his sentence. "You must be the one who made all those additions to the city. You're good. Too good: you attracted a lot of trouble."

"Maybe I just need someone to keep me out of trouble," he said, giving her a smile. He liked her independence and her strength and her frankness.

She gave him a Look, but she was smiling as well, and it was the kind of smile he wanted to see for the rest of his life.


End file.
